MAYVILLE – Chautauqua County Executive George Borrello (R-Irving) has released a tentative county budget for 2019 that includes no increase in the county tax rate.
During the County Legislature’s meeting Wednesday night in Mayville, Borrello spent about 14 minutes going over the highlights of his $254 million budget proposal, which is just $200,000 higher than the current year’s spending plan.
First-year County Executive George Borrello presented his first spending plan to the county legislature Wednesday night during its September voting session.
Borrello said the biggest challenge was trying to find ways to close a more-than $4 million budget deficit and that was accomplished by identifying a series of small budget cuts that added up to a large savings.
“We started off with a business principle – the ‘Bushel Full of Pennies’ theory. That is, a penny by itself isn’t worth much. Most people wouldn’t even pick up a penny by itself if it was sitting on the sidewalk, but if you have a bushel full of pennies, then that adds up to some real money,” Borrello said while unveiling a large basket of pennies on the floor of the legislature to illustrate his point. “So we challenged our department heads to come with their pennies. We have a budget of $250 million with thousands of line items. So to bring a few minor savings in all these line items, it can add up to a significant savings. That’s essentially the ‘Bushel Full of Pennies’ theory.”
Borrello said many of the cuts were small, although one noteworthy adjustment was the closing of the county methane energy plant at the county landfill and instead sell the methane on the open market.
“With the declining electricity prices the plant has begun to lose money. In 2017 we had a net operating loss of about $139,000. This year the plant will lose about $200,000,” Borrello pointed out. “So the idea will be to actually shut down our methane plant and instead sell the methane to a company that will scrub it and turn it into a renewable natural gas into the pipeline.”
Borrello added that the selling of the methane, rather than converting it to electricity on-site, would help generate an additional $1 million in profit for the county.
The county executive said he also wants to increase efficiency and savings in billing by requiring all vendors to accept electronic payments from the county and also seek out service bids with various vendors on a more frequent basis.
While the county tax rate won’t change, Borrello did tell WRFA following his presentation that the tax levy is going up by 2 percent.
“The tax levy will increase and this is due to increases in property values and other things, but that’s really what we want to see, right? It’s the tax rate that determines how much you pay and the levy is all about increases in property values – you know, people buying homes. Our mortgage taxes are up which is a sign that more people are buying property in our area,” Borrello explained. “The levy is the idea of creating the pie so that everbody’s piece of it smaller. So I’m happy the levy is increasing because that means we’ll be able to keep property taxes under control and hopefully be able to reduce them in future years.”
In addition to a higher tax levy for the 2019 revenue line, Borrello said he’s also increased the occupancy (bed) tax and sales tax lines, adding that those projections are conservative and he’s confident they are within reach.
In all, Borrello called his first spending plan an historic one, noting that it is the first time in at least 10 years a county spending plan has been proposed with no use of unassigned fund balance while also holding the line on taxes while investing in county infrastructure.
The county legislature’s Audit and Control committee will begin reviewing the budget next week through a series of scheduled hearings with various departments. Committee chairman Pierre Chagnon (R-Bemus Point) said he looks forward to reviewing all the numbers during that part of the process, but also said his initial reaction is that it’s very good starting point.
“I’m impressed. How could you not be impressed? A balanced budget with no tax increase is very impressive,” Chagnon said. “But we expect nothing less from our former legislator who served on our Audit and Control Committee and I had the pleasure of serving on that committee with him for four years. He came in with the right attitude. He came in with an objective. He got everyone working with him and as he said, they gave targets and everyone met or beat the targets they were given, so it sounds almost too good to be true at this point.”
The county legislature has until Dec. 1 to finalize and approve next year’s budget, though it’s likely the spending plan will be acted on well in advance, most likely during the next legislature meeting on Oct. 24.
Copies of the 2019 Tentative Budget Presentation and the Chautauqua County 2019 Tentative Budget will be available online by September 30. The presentation will be available on the County Executive’s website at www.co.chautauqua.ny.us/186/County-Executive and the tentative budget will be available on the Finance Department’s website at www.co.chautauqua.ny.us/213/Finance .
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